Canova to challenge Wasserman Schultz
Tim Canova, who bedeviled Congresswoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz formostof2016, is preparing for RoundTwo.
“I’m a candidate again,” he said Thursday night, announcing that he’ll challengeWasserman Schultz in the 2018 Democratic congressional primary in the Broward/Miami-Dade County 23rd Congressional District.
“Our party and our country have departed dramatically from the agenda, the progressive agenda, that made this country great,” Canova said. “The agenda that I’m running on is a full employment, New Deal agenda.”
The Canova-Wasserman Schultz rematch will be one of the hottest congressional primaries in South Florida.
Canova has, in effect, been running against Wasserman Schultz since Aug. 31 of last year— the day after he lost the 2016 primary.
Just two weeks after the primary, Canova was the featured speaker at a demonstration outside Wasserman Schultz’s district office against the proposed TransPacific Trade agreement. (President Donald Trump withdrew the United States from TPP during his first week in office).
Canova pushed out a stream of anti-Wasserman Schultz commentary on social media. He has kept alive a political organization, which allows him to raise money, organize events and pay staffers.
His group, Progress For All, has taken liberal stands on multiple issues, and been especially critical of the new Sabal Tail gas pipeline in northern and central Florida. He’s already registered as a 2018 candidate, though he said at the time of the filing last year it was done for fundraising legalities andwasn’t a guarantee he’d run again.
He already claimed a victory this week overWasserman Schultz and the Democratic Party establishment. He said the party had dropped plans to have Wasserman Schultz welcome participants to the big, annual state Democratic Party fundraising dinner on Saturday after he complained that hewouldn’t get equal time.
Wassermann Schultz isn’t on the speaking schedule for the dinner, which is held in her district at the Diplomat Resort in Hollywood. A state Democratic Party spokeswoman declined to comment on Canova’s assertion or why Wasserman Schultz isn’t on the schedule.
He said he’d champion progressive values and advocate policies that would aid the majority of citizens, rather than the richest sliver of American society and big corporation.
He said it’s wrong that there are seniors in South Floridawholiveinnearpoverty in the “richest country on the face of the earth.”
Just 18 months ago, few people had heard of Canova, a Hollywood resident and professor of law and public finance at Nova SoutheasternUniversity.
He was the undisputed underdog and Wasserman Schultz was chairwoman of the Democratic National Committee.
But she was wounded by turmoil surrounding the 2016 presidential primaries, with supporters of Bernie Sanders accusing her of favoring Hillary Clinton, the eventual nominee.
Canova harnessed the energy— and online campaign contributions — from Sanders fans who detested Wasserman Schultz to become the biggest threat she faced during her political career.
He raised $3.8million for last year’s campaign from more than 80,000 individual donors running against Wassermann Schultz much the way Sanders campaigned against Clinton.
Canova accused Wasserman Schultz of championing the interests of large campaign contributors at the expense of everyday voters.
month before last year’s congressional primary, Wasserman Schultz resigned as Democratic national chairwoman after hacked party emails distributed by WikiLeaks showed that staffers at the party did, in fact, favor Sanders over Clinton.
aman@sunsentinel.com